The Indian government claims it will aid competition. For who? For the big brands perhaps, but the fact that a Tesco Express store seems to be opening in every street in the UK is testament to the fact that it certainly won't help smaller independent retailers who simply cannot compete. I would like to compare the numbers of small independent retailers now and 10 years ago in the UK, I bet the numbers have decreased greatly.
Prime Minister, Manmohan Singh, also claims that it will help to drive down prices which have risen dramatically with inflation. However this has gone to the other extreme in the UK, where prices for farmers have been driven down so low that many farmers are struggling to stay in business.
Surely India has only to look to England to realise this move can only benefit the big chains and continue to help the rich get rich and the poor even poorer, which seems to be a common theme. I read an article in India Today that advocated the opinion that the Government in India was an enemy of the poor and that by setting the poverty line at 32 rupees per person in urban areas and 26 rupees in rural areas this was actually adversely effecting ordinary Indians. Currently the government claims that 32% of Indians live below the poverty line. This means that 32% of Indians survive on less than 50p a day in urban areas. But the article, in my opinion, was arguing that by setting the poverty line so low they are confirming that it is okay for ordinary people to live on so little, that they need no more than the absolute minimum for survival.
Another argument for opening up the market to foreign retailers was that there would be no end of choice for the Indian consumer. This may be true but at a cost. We are used to being able to go to one store and get everything we need, sorry want. It is irrelevant whether we can actually grow that produce, whether it is in season, we can still get it. That is what we have become accustomed to, we expect to be able to get everything and anything we want. The result is being sold tasteless fruit and veg, that have been imported at great expense to the environment and to us, that have been stored/frozen for weeks in some dock container.
That was one of the things that was so wonderful about travelling around India - the fresh, flavoursome food. If you ate at a local place, okay you had choices limited to what they could grow or obtain locally, but the food was all freshly prepared. You could eat a well balanced meal of rice, vegetables and lentils for very little cost. Okay we did not eat a lot of meat and a majority of people in India are vegetarian, for religious reasons. Also it is not so easy to keep meat fresh. But still if meat is used it is sourced locally. It may not look as juicy or each cut as 'meaty', but nor has the animal or the meat been pumped full of additives or water.
I have also heard that a lot of vegetable/fruit produce is rejected and wasted by supermarket chains because of how it looks. Apparently British consumers are reluctant to buy an apple unless it is perfectly formed, there is not a blemish or lump in sight. There seems to be parallels here with our cosmetic/modelling/MTV/ celebrity culture!! But how ridiculous, since when does it matter what a potato looks like? What does it taste like? Where did it come from? Is it fresh? Are surely more appropriate questions? But seemingly people fail to consider this and I have to admit in the past I have been one of these people. Much more concerned with being able to get what I need in as little time as possible, only considering the effect on my pocket and time.
Reflecting on my life back in the UK I realise I have spent a lot of time telling myself and anyone else that will listen, what a busy life I lead. That I order my food online from a big supermarket chain because I don't have enough time and I save money. What rubbish! It's taken this 3 months of taking my head out of my own........life (!) to consider my impact on the world around me. I hope when I return to a working life somewhere, sometime soon, I will remember this and take the time to support local retailers, to buy fresh produce from independent stores and prepare more food from scratch. My sister has always been a great advocate of this and does a great job of preparing fresh exciting meals each day. There is no reason why I cannot do this. I'm thinking about having a family in the near(ish) future and I don't want to teach my children to be selfish or apathetic about what they consume.
Another trend that I hope India does not follow, is being able to buy convenience in terms of ready-made food. A wonderful part of the culture, that is lacking in the UK, is the passing down of family recipes. A huge part of Indian culture, according to families we met, is cooking and eating together. Most importantly cooking meals from scratch, making your own roti etc. Every family we met on the trains had brought entire meals with them, which they without fail wanted to share with us. Working mothers cook fresh meals and take great pride in this. I know many families in the UK still do this, but I believe there is a risk within our generation and the generation after us of loosing this, of convenience winning over healthy, nutricious food. People buy 'diet' meals instead of cooking for themselves, which they can guarantee has no additives etc. I am definitely guilty of buying ready-made sauces and filled pasta as a quick meal. I have a very small repertoire of basic meals that I make from scratch. Must do better! It's also so cheap to buy a 'meal' at a Weatherspoons or similar chains, which can be cheaper than buying all the ingredients and cooking from scratch. It's also cheaper to buy some chicken (in the loosest possible sense) and frozen chips than cook a healthy well balanced meal. This doesn't make much sense to my simple brain. Fresh food has been sent to a factory to be processed and created, you'd think this would cost more! No wonder we are fighting obesity in the Western world.
In the same vein, I often question the 'convenience' of using the internet, especially since we have been away. In the past I'd always rather book a hotel on the net or do my banking online. But I think actually in a lot of cases this is a false economy. I've had situations where I've tried to inform my mobile phone contractor that I want to cancel my contract etc. and this is such a pa-lava online with all the security checks etc. There are so many instances where it is so much quicker and straight forward to speak to someone. And I think actually I lost some confidence and felt deskilled at talking on the phone and communicating in different situations. It's really important to be able to relate to people over the phone or face to face. Anonymity is not always such a good thing. Things tend to get done much quicker and are more likely to be achieved if there is a personal element. You would think as a teacher this would have been obvious to me!!
Of course, there is also the transport aspect of our convenience culture. Jumping in the car to nip to Tesco's, a ten minute stroll down the road, because it's raining or because you've got 'so many other things to do'. Or as I'm guilty of, driving to work to save ten minutes each morning and evening, even though it's probably more expensive to drive. The hundreds of thousands of journeys we make as a nation each day that are unnecessary, the impact this has on our environment. I hope instead of sounding like I am on my high horse I am simply demonstrating how far from a 'good' and 'moral' citizen I am. Hopefully I have countered this in some way in my teaching, even if I am not leading by example and am a huge hypocrite! Must do better, before I can preach.
So to finish....watch this space! Will the Indian government continue to block foreign companies having considered the effect on ordinary Indians or just out of the inability to get anything done as a congress? And will I take the small step of changing my own behaviour? If I can't then this may be good news for a nation that are already doing things 'right' (in terms of not living for convenience) and terrible news for the UK who are loosing the battle to a nation of convenience nuts, which in turn is having a detrimental effect on health and our economy.
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